About

The legal department of Abu Dhabi-listed investment company Waha Capital (Waha) is headed by general counsel and company secretary Peter Howley and is comprised of three other members, namely, senior legal counsel Carolyn Ang, legal counsel Arnela Colo, and legal assistant and translator Amal Moufdi. Waha has transformed its legal function over the last year to ensure that it is better equipped to deal with the diverse range of complex legal issues it faces from across the sector including energy, fin-tech and healthcare investments. In the past year the legal team at Waha has worked on a number of deals including the sale of its stake in UAE-based NPS Holdings to National Energy Services Reunited (NESR). The transaction formed part of a complex de-SPAC process on the Nasdaq market and saw NESR acquire NPS and Oman-based Gulf Energy. This combination formed the first listed oilfield services firm in the Middle East and North Africa region. Pursuant to the transaction, Waha will receive approximately AED251m in cash proceeds, and approximately 5.5 million shares in NESR, issued at an initial value of US$10 per share and representing an interest of approximately 6.2% in the company. This was a ground-breaking deal not just for Waha, but for the industry and the region. Similarly, the team worked on the acquisition of a significant minority stake in Channel VAS, a rapidly growing financial technology company. Channel VAS is the premium fintech provider of mobile financial and value added services for mobile operators, through big data and proprietary analytics tools and exceeded the US$1bn mark in loans in 2016. From a legal perspective, the IP and technology focus was of particular importance in a fast-growing, asset light, new generation fintech company. The transaction marked the entry into a new and exciting sector for Waha and has already proven to be a positive and successful move. Additionally, through its 100% owned healthcare vertical, Waha Capital sold Proficiency Healthcare Diagnostics (PHD) to Al Borg Medical Laboratories, the Gulf Cooperation Council’s (GCC) largest chain of private laboratories. This was a significant milestone for Waha as it marked the final chapter in an investment narrative in the diagnostics space, which originally saw the company source and acquire a 70% stake in PHD in April 2013 and from that time, grow both the business and its stake therein. Howley identifies particular members of his team as being key to the firm’s success. Firstly, he says Moufdi ‘is not only our certified translator but assumes significant responsibility in respect of liaising with regulators across the GCC. [She] allows the team to be responsive and pro-active in respect of dealing with any regulatory and local law issues’. Regarding Ang, Howley says that since she joined she ‘has proven herself to be a diligent, focussed and a very commercial addition to the team. Her background has enabled us to provide expert advice across a number of sectors, providing significant efficiencies for the company in terms of use of external counsel’.